Students were asked to do research into the changes in literacy practices that have and will occur in their chosen profession as new communication technologies are introduced. There were three parts to the assignment.
Resource collection and annotation (on a blog or wiki)
Interviews with academics and professionals in the student's field or profession
The diversity of media types that the students can use in these assignments: text, linked cites, images, audiio (and lately YouTube videos), give them a chance to experiment with new semiotic systems and show off skills that are normally ignored in professional communication classes.
A year ago Andrea was an excellent student in my Topics in Professional Communication course. Now she works for a PR company in Columbus and volunteered to talk with me about online publishing systems like blogs and wikis one year into her new profession (~4:45 min.).
Julie's voice
Julie agreed to talk to me about technology as she took my class. At this point in the term, there was no doubt that she we going to do very welll in the course, so I take her comments to be genuine. I also learned a bit about how journalists were struggling (as we all are) with the implications of new media (blogs, wikis, podcasts, ...) for their discipline and occupation (~3:30 min.).
My motivations or “Industrial Media for Teachers"
I’m fascinated by the possibilities these days of using every-day or inexpensive tools (cell phones / PDAs / recorders / online services) to capture and publish “industrial quality” audio (and video) as well as images and text. These all seem like useful tools for communicators (and teachers) to use for the purposes of learning and for production work on the job. I use Blogger.com, http://www.OurMedia.org, our local streaming server, and an in-house resource called Media Manager to store and publish audio clips. You might also explore Odeo.org for “direct from computer” audio capture and Audacity (free) for editing.
I received more focused and discipline-specific writing out of my professional communication students than ever before. But they also had many other modalities to choose from as rhetoricians: Our objective was to practice using all available means of persuasion! In addition, these venues provide real audiences and many levels of “publicness.” By that I mean that we had to make decisions about
Personal Information
Shared, collaborative editing strategies
Community formation
Making content easily searchable
Commenting / Interactivity
Spam control
All of these issues, possibilities, and affordances have interesting negative and productive implications for educators and professionals. They give us, the students and I, a chance to make those implications explicit.
Journalistic Electronic Expressions: Written, Aural, & Visual
Students were asked to do research into the changes in literacy practices that have and will occur in their chosen profession as new communication technologies are introduced. There were three parts to the assignment.A more complete description of the assignments can be found here.
The diversity of media types that the students can use in these assignments: text, linked cites, images, audiio (and lately YouTube videos), give them a chance to experiment with new semiotic systems and show off skills that are normally ignored in professional communication classes.
Andrea's voice
A year ago Andrea was an excellent student in my Topics in Professional Communication course. Now she works for a PR company in Columbus and volunteered to talk with me about online publishing systems like blogs and wikis one year into her new profession (~4:45 min.).Julie's voice
Julie agreed to talk to me about technology as she took my class. At this point in the term, there was no doubt that she we going to do very welll in the course, so I take her comments to be genuine. I also learned a bit about how journalists were struggling (as we all are) with the implications of new media (blogs, wikis, podcasts, ...) for their discipline and occupation (~3:30 min.).My motivations or “Industrial Media for Teachers"
I’m fascinated by the possibilities these days of using every-day or inexpensive tools (cell phones / PDAs / recorders / online services) to capture and publish “industrial quality” audio (and video) as well as images and text. These all seem like useful tools for communicators (and teachers) to use for the purposes of learning and for production work on the job. I use Blogger.com, http://www.OurMedia.org, our local streaming server, and an in-house resource called Media Manager to store and publish audio clips. You might also explore Odeo.org for “direct from computer” audio capture and Audacity (free) for editing.I received more focused and discipline-specific writing out of my professional communication students than ever before. But they also had many other modalities to choose from as rhetoricians: Our objective was to practice using all available means of persuasion! In addition, these venues provide real audiences and many levels of “publicness.” By that I mean that we had to make decisions about
All of these issues, possibilities, and affordances have interesting negative and productive implications for educators and professionals. They give us, the students and I, a chance to make those implications explicit.
Handout